


Roller Coaster Ride

by kierathefangirl



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Anxiety Disorder, Bad Touch Trio, France is a bit of a jerk but maybe he'll come round I'm not sure yet, Lovi being antisocial but sweet, M/M, Multi, Roller Coaster, Social Anxiety, Spain has a dad and he's a cop, Toni being a dorky and adorable smol, bad friends trio, both of them (Spamano) have Social Anxiety Disorder, gerita - Freeform, some bromance between Prussia and Romano they actually get along, spamano - Freeform, theme park
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-11 04:07:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15964352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kierathefangirl/pseuds/kierathefangirl
Summary: "“You need a pair to ride this roller coaster,” the man tells me apologetically. Then he turns to the line and raises his voice. “Any singles here?”Two teens grab their friend’s hand and lift it into the air. A worker goes out, fetches the embarrassed teen, and drags him up to the front of the line. ..."In other words, Toni being a dorky and adorable smol and Lovi being antisocial but sweet. :)





	1. You Need A Pair To Ride

**Author's Note:**

> Based off a Tumblr prompt (don't know who, if you know the author let me know so I can credit them): "Sorry, you need a pair to ride this roller coaster. Any singles here?" (might not be word for word)
> 
> Both Lovi and Toni have Social Anxiety Disorder. I've never been to a psychiatrist/therapist so I don't know if I have S.A.D., just that this is how I write them having Social Anxiety Disorder. Also, not all social anxiety comes across the same, so don't assume all people with social anxiety act or think like this.
> 
> I am ADHD (diagnosed by a doctor so I know for sure) and dyslexic so there may be things I don't catch (jumping all over the place, spelling errors)...so please let me know if you catch any of that.
> 
> Don't be afraid to make suggestions! I love getting feedback and would like to hear where you guys think I should take this. :)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unfortunately you can't ride this coaster alone...to Lovi's dismay. :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I should say I don't hate France. I've been thinking of ways for him to come around later...suggestions are welcome. He'll make it up somehow. :)
> 
> The first chapter is long. It goes through the ride, then on to their afterwards conversation all the way until they suggest food. A few will be long...one is about four paragraphs I think.

**_~Lovi~_ **

“You need a pair to ride this roller coaster,” the man tells me apologetically. Then he turns to the line and raises his voice. “Any singles here?”

Two teens grab their friend’s hand and lift it into the air. A worker goes out, fetches the embarrassed teen, and drags him up to the front of the line. The couple in the car gets out, and the man gestures. “Get in.”

The teen slides in. I swallow a complaint and sit down as far from him as I can get. They click the bar down, and the car slides forward and stops to let the next pair off.

The teen is still bright red, and his eyes angle away from me. The first thought that comes to mind is _social anxiety_. He won’t speak, he won’t even look over at me. He’s too nervous.

I take a deep breath and offer my right hand. “Lovino.”

He goes a deeper shade of red, but feathery fingers briefly close on my hand. “Toni,” he answers meekly.

He pulls back and looks away quickly. The roller coaster edges forward a little again.

My tense body relaxes a little into the seat, no longer cringing away from the strange new teenage boy. _Maybe he won’t be so bad._ He’s not a bully, _that’s_ for sure.

Toni is quiet for most of the time the roller coaster inches forward. But slowly, his grip on the bar loosens and some natural color returns to his face. He breathes deeply and relaxes into the seat. He’s no longer freaking out. The fact that I’m not forcing him to talk seems to help.

He finally gets to the point that he shoots a shy glance my way of his own accord. That’s the cue that he’s okay now.

“First time on a roller coaster?” I ask.

He blushes and nods. I flash a shy smile. “First time is always the worst.”

He shivers and doesn’t answer. Finally the entire contraption starts to roll, to chug its merry way up the giant hill. I swallow the sinking feeling in my stomach, breathe, and close my eyes.

It’s quiet a moment, then we’re falling. I peek over at Toni to see how he reacts; his eyes go wide, but the wind steals his brief shriek. The coaster zips around a corner, flips us upside down, and twirls a couple times. He’s tense again, but he’s not screaming. His knuckles are white on the bar, but he doesn’t protest. He squeezes his eyes shut like I did on my first ride, and he struggles to breathe.

I reach over and lay a light hand over his. “Breathe,” I remind him.

He blushes and his eyes peek over at me. He struggles another breath into his lungs. I breathe, too, just in time for the roller coaster to flip upside down again.

His face pales a little, but he manages to breathe. His hand turns over under mine, and his thin fingers latch onto my hand. Our hands fall from the bar to sit between us, and he looks a tiny bit more comfortable than he was a moment ago. I’m not entirely comfortable with this, but I can suck up a little nerves to help him out.

We go through one more time, then the coaster stops to let people off. The people in front of us leap from their seats with gleeful grins and head straight back into line.

The coaster scoots up, and the attendant lifts the bar to let us off. I slide from the seat, and he follows. He still doesn’t let go of my hand, and he’s trembling slightly. This ride isn’t the greatest coaster for a first-timer.

We slide off and out from the ride, and he blinks a couple times and shakes his head. His grip on my hand loosens slightly, and his fingers twitch with unease. I drag him over to one of the benches and pull him down to sit for a minute, rather than encouraging another ride like someone more extroverted and less socially anxious would’ve done.

Toni flashes a relieved smile and starts to chew on the inside of his bottom lip. I close my eyes and take a minute to breathe. He’s not a bad guy, but my head is screaming obscenities at me for not taking the opportunity to run before I screw up and scare him off. But I know, somewhere deep behind the panic, that his mind is doing the same thing to him. So I just breathe and wait.

Finally his hand stops shaking, and his teeth retreat from his lip. The color has returned to his smooth skin, turning petrified white to a comfortable tan. He breathes a couple deep breaths, and though his voice trembles slightly he musters the courage to speak. “I don’t usually do roller coasters because they like to go upside-down. My friends are fine with it and even enjoy it, but I don’t do upside-down.”

I laugh a little and open my eyes. “Some friends.”

“They’re—they’re good friends,” he mutters. “They just really like to push all kinds of boundaries. They’re there when I need them, but they’re also there when I don’t want them to be.”

“That’s good to a point,” I say. “But some things can’t be fixed. Like Social Anxiety Disorder.”

He blushes. “Is it that obvious?”

“I am, too,” I shrug. “So to me, yes. I don’t know about other people. Your friends probably don’t realize because they’re not. My brother doesn’t even know. I doubt they’d notice.”

Toni looks surprised. “I can’t tell.”

“I’m an introvert and I’m quiet about it,” I shrug. “I don’t have any friends because of it, but that’s fine. I don’t have panic attacks every day trying not to run from people who decide to talk to me for whatever reason. They all avoid me.”

He blinks a bit. “Having friends is cool, once you get to the point you’re comfortable with them. It’s just hard to start.”

“You’re more extroverted than me,” I remind him. “It’s easier when you like people to not freak out, or to relax when you do.”

He bites his lip thoughtfully, then concedes, “You have a point.”

He finally lets go of my hand and flashes a shy smile. “I’m from Spain,” he tells me. He has a look like he expects me to hate him for that, but I’m an immigrant, too.

“Italy,” I answer.

He runs shaky fingers through his messy brown hair. My eyes are drawn, while his attention is elsewhere, to the emerald green orbs sitting in the cavern that houses his deeply haunted eyes. I get the feeling his S.A. D. was caused by some external event, not by DNA as mine was (though mine was certainly made a lot worse by external events).

After a minute, his eyes turn to mine and I look away again.

The albino and blonde from the line appear behind us, and the albino drops a hand on Toni’s shoulder. “Hey, man,” the albino greets Toni cheerfully. “You dating hot boy yet?”

Toni goes scarlet and doesn’t even manage a coherent answer. I just laugh it off and flip the albino off. “Fuck off, whitie.”

The albino grins in response, and Toni looks a tad relieved. He moves a step closer and offers a pale hand. “Gil.”

“Lovi,” I answer, but I don’t let him touch me. I don’t trust him.

Eventually, Gil just drops his hand and shrugs it off. The blonde takes my hand without offering or asking or otherwise giving me a choice and introduces himself as Francis Bonnefoy, the ‘ _Frenchman on a mission_ ’. I pull away and glare at him.

Toni edges closer to me and tells his blonde friend rather stiffly to leave me alone. He seems to have noticed the cringe when I was touched, the unease as I tugged my hand from the unwanted grip of the Frenchman.

Blondie laughs and dismisses his friend’s warning. I get up and move around the table, coming to a stop on my toes a step behind Toni.

“I don’t think he wants to be touched, man,” Gil says apologetically.

Blondie scoffs. “He just hasn’t been touched the right way, eh?”

He winks, and I shiver and tell him rather stiffly to “fuck off, Blondie.”

He laughs again. “I’m not _that_ blonde, sweetheart,” he says.

“How many of you does it take to change a lightbulb?” I fire at him.

He laughs again, and doesn’t take the hint of stiffness and purposeful put-offishness.

Toni gets up, too, and he glares at the Frenchman. “Francis. Take a fucking chill pill.  Back off.”

“You can’t keep him all to yourself,” Francis laughs.

Toni clenches his fists at his side, musters his courage, and says through clenched teeth, “Back the fuck off. You’re being a dick, and nobody likes it.”

Gil looks between Toni and Francis with surprise twinkling in his ruby eyes. “Toni?” he asks uncertainly. Apparently, Toni’s never stood up to them like this before.

Toni shakes his head. “He has Social Anxiety Disorder and you’re going to make it worse if you force him to do anything he doesn’t want to, like touch you.”

Gil blinks a few times. Francis’ smile only barely fades. Toni still looks serious.

Gil sidesteps Toni and tilts his head at me. “You okay?”

I take a deep breath to calm my racing heart. “Give me a minute.”

Gil takes that for the no it is and turns to his blonde friend with a far more serious gaze. “Francis.”

The blonde still doesn’t take the hint, so—for the first time, I’d bet—Toni just straight-up _punches_ him. “Back the fuck off.”

“Are _you_ okay?” Gil asks.

Toni shakes his hand a little. “I don’t know. Jittery.”

“He has it, too,” I tell Gil, because he seems to care.

Gil’s eyes widen. “Social Anxiety Disorder, you mean?”

I nod, and now Gil looks uncertainly to Toni.

Toni shrugs it off. “Didn’t need mentioning. I can contain the panic attacks for the most part.”

Gil blinks again. Toni returns his attention to the stunned blonde. “Back. Off. I’m not joking right now. This is serious. Leave him alone, or leave.”

Toni points a shaky finger away from us. Francis takes the latter option, and he skedaddles the fuck away.

“That was rather violent for you,” Gil says. He seems a little unsure of himself now.

Toni shakes his hand out a few more times, and he turns around and totally ignores Gil’s comment. “You okay?”

I nod meekly. Toni reaches out hesitantly and squeezes my shoulder in attempted reassurance. “He’s just…like that. I-it’s not you.”

I shake my head. “I’m used to assholes. That doesn’t bother me so much as the touch itself. I generally don’t like touch.”

Toni sighs. Gil reaches out a hesitant hand and pokes the back of his friend’s shoulder. “Toni?”

Toni slowly turns around. Tears now glisten in his nearly lifeless eyes.

Gil steps forward and wraps the trembling brunette up in gentle arms. “You could’ve told us, sweetheart.”

Toni’s head falls on the albino’s shoulder, and he actually starts to cry. This is his version of a panic attack; in his head, obscenities are being hurled at him for pushing away his friend and punching him.

Gil seems to recognize this, too, and his grip tightens around the tall and toned frame before him. “Shhh,” he hushes him, much like a father would for his son. “It’s okay. Breathe. Breathe. Stay with me.”

Gil just accidentally worked his way into my ‘ _maybe I can trust you_ ’ book. His gentle care, his immediate acceptance of the inherent flaw in his best friend, and the calm acceptance, with a little time, of my refusal to touch his hand…he’s definitely a deeply caring person who—maybe, with some time—I could learn to trust. Maybe.

It takes Toni about ten minutes to calm. Gil never once complains, and he patiently out-waits Toni’s shock of panic. Even then, he doesn’t let go. He pulls back a little bit, dries the tears from Toni’s cheeks with his sleeve, and asks if Toni is okay.

Toni chokes a weak laugh. “I-I think so. I’ve had worse.”

Only then, upon assurance that Toni will be fine, does Gil let go. This further engraves his name on a list of possible trustworthy people, right under Toni and my two brothers. (My brothers have earned their way, even after the fiasco with our family, onto a list of trustworthy and possibly trustworthy people. I’m not trying to be an ass and I don’t hate nor fear my brothers.)

Toni steps back to my side. Gil takes a step forward and sweeps me over with his eyes, then he asks quietly, “Are you okay?”

I swallow once, breathe, and nod. “I think so, yeah.”

Gil now offers his hand again, but without the same expectation of response he had before. It’s a gesture of good faith now, an offer of the same friendship he just displayed with Toni.

I don’t immediately leap to accept the offer, but after a slight hesitation I work up the courage to briefly touch his hand. He lights the fuck up, and a smile pulls thin lips to stretch towards the heavens.

I still don’t prolong the contact, but this gentle soul appreciates the brief moment he earned and doesn’t complain. Instead, he turns to Toni and offers, “Food?”

Toni hesitates, then nods meekly. “That would be nice.”

Gil turns to me, extending the offer across the space between us. I haven’t eaten a decent meal in months, so the offer makes my mouth water. But I don’t want to be rude, either.

“It-it’s fine,” I tell him nervously. “I can fend for myself.”

Gil laughs. “Nonsense! Come on, how long’s it been since you’ve had some fancy-ass expensive amusement park pizza?”

Toni holds out his hand in offering. He understands better than Gil my real reasoning for refusing isn’t that I’m not hungry, it’s for social reasons.

“You can’t honestly tell me you’re not hungry,” Gil continues.

I cough a couple times. It’s so quiet in sure Gil can’t hear, but I make the comment that I haven’t eaten in months so I _am_ hungry, but not hungry enough to eat in front of people I hardly know and embarrass myself.

Toni hears my comment, even though his friend doesn’t. His eyes go wide, and he asks me why not. I tell him that food is expensive, especially for me and my little brother where we live together, alone, with no adult to govern who eats what when.

Toni opens his hand to encourage me, and he tells his friend that due to the cost, I haven’t actually eaten in months. Gil insists I really should join them.

“He’s shy,” Toni explains. “He’s nervous about eating in front of people he doesn’t know.”

Toni gestures around at the giant park. Gil sighs. “We can probably find a mostly empty corner to hide in.”

Toni turns back to me. I can already see by their negotiations and the seriousness of the looks on their faces I won’t get out of this one.

I sigh and look away. Toni recognizes the tiny admission of defeat, and he takes my hand in gentle fingers and pulls me after them. _I guess we’ll see how this one ends._


	2. Serious Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After eating, the talk turns serious...too serious for Toni's comfort.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The transgender and sexuality stuff was a headcanon that I ran with...and it kinda fits. I'm also rainbow...a rainbow with a giant "???" on it because jeeze sexuality is confusing. :)
> 
> Perspective identified at beginning of chapter! :D

**_~Lovi~_ **

Toni and Gil split a large pizza. Gil buys me an extra-large pizza just for me, and Toni and Gil keep their eyes off me and chat with each other to let me eat in peace.

I finish off the last piece just as they finish a tense conversation about Social Anxiety Disorder. Toni seems to indicate he doesn’t want to discuss the topic.

Gil throws the boxes in the recycling bucket and invites me into the conversation. “Isn’t it usually caused by external events?”

I shrug. “I was born with it. It was exacerbated by external events, but that wasn’t the cause. You can tell the difference by their eyes.”

I gesture to Toni. “His eyes are haunted, almost lifeless. Surviving but not living, for at least the first few years. On the other hand,  _ your _ eyes have light in them. Still a little haunted, but not to the same degree that his are. You can tell if you know what to look for.”

Gil looks to Toni. Toni shifts uneasily. “Spain wasn’t easy,” he mutters.

“Italy wasn’t easy,” I agree. “Feli is bi and trans, and our older brother Sebastian is bi. Throw some extreme Italian Catholics and mafia-men into that mix, and you’ve got Italy.”

“Feli’s trans?” Gil asks.

I nod. He blinks. “Oh. I…couldn’t tell.”

“He’s thirteen,” I tell him, “and he’s known he was a guy since he was three years old. So yeah, nobody can tell.”

“Oh.”

Toni clears his throat. “Are you?”

“Am I what?”

Toni fidgets. “Trans.”

“…Maybe. That’s the best I’ll give you.”

Gil blinks. “That has to make things harder. When did you leave?”

“I was eight and Feli was six. We waited until Sebastian was eighteen. It was a hellish couple years.”

“ _ You knew when you were six? _ ”

I shift and look away. “I went to Catholic school for the first time that year, like kindergarten. Some random guy kissed me and ran off.  _ They _ freaked but I didn’t. But when a girl did the same thing a few months later,  _ I _ freaked but  _ they _ didn’t. I knew by the time I was six and a half.”

“I’m bi,” Gil says. “Me, my little brother Ludwig—he’s gay—and our parents got out that year. I was eleven.”

“I was ten,” Toni says quietly. “My mom is—or was—a conversion therapist. It didn’t go over too well. Especially when I said I wasn’t broken and didn’t need to be fixed. My dad came with me, but my three older brothers and my mom didn’t.”

“I didn’t know your mom was even alive,” Gil says, surprised. “You don’t talk about her like she is.”

“Oh, she’s alive,” Toni says blandly. “But she might as well not be.”

Gil’s eyes widen. “That’s cold.”

“Jesús is a priest,” Toni adds. “He hates me. Matías y Andrés are probably just too busy to drop in.”

“Brothers?” I ask.

Toni nods. Gil swallows and tilts his head. “I didn’t know you even  _ had _ brothers.”

“I do,” Toni shrugs with that same cold, dead monotone. “But I might as well not for how often they reach out and prove they give a damn.”

“Just because they don’t always reach out doesn’t mean they don’t care,” I point out. “Sebastian lives in New York City and rarely has the time to reach out, but he cares a hell of a lot. They can care but be too busy to get a moment for you.”

“That’s true,” Toni agrees. “But Mom has time to call Dad on a daily basis just to talk about mundane things, and she doesn’t spare a second for me.”

“That’s different,” I shrug.

“That’s fucking  _ mean _ ,” Gil says.

Toni blushes deep red, swallows, and shifts his weight to the left. “I’ve gotten used to the silence.”

“Do you have a number you could call or text?” I ask.

Toni shakes his head. “No. Dad probably does, but it’s not worth the time and effort.”

“Maybe not for your mom,” I agree, “but what about your brothers? Both of my parents are shit and I get giving up on her, especially when she’s talking to your dad but not you.  _ However _ . Sweetheart. Does that mean you just give up on your brothers because she’s a bitch?”

Toni blushes again. Gil nudges him. “He’s right.”

I step forward, in Toni’s direction. “It can’t hurt to try. If you’re shut down, you’re shut down. If you’re not, wouldn’t it be great to have them back?”

Toni drops his eyes. My brain is starting to fight itself now; if I can tell Toni to be brave, to try anyway because there’s a chance, but I can’t even try to reach out to the dad I spent every day loving and looking up to even though I desperately want to…what kind of hypocrite am I?  _ Suck it up and try,  _ my brain bashes against itself.

Gil notices the change. He steps forward and reaches out a hand. “Lovi? Y’okay?”

I shake my head a little, trying to cast the voices away, and reach up to dig my fists into my eyes until lights pop out. But the voices don’t go away, because the voices are right.

I take a deep breath and turn back to Toni, who’s now got that concerned look darkening his eyes again. “Don’t wait until it’s too late. Don’t let them forget about you. Don’t get to the point that they can let go of you. Make them  _ want _ to stay. Because once you lose them for good like that, you  _ won’t _ get them back. There’s not even a chance.”

Gil nudges me with the back of his hand. “Lovi.”

I brush his hand off of me. “I’m fine.”

“I doubt that,” he says.

“Why ask if you already know the answer? I’m never going to say I’m not okay, because if you admit you’re not okay it just makes everything worse.”

Toni steps forward and lays a light hand on my shoulder. “It’s okay to not be okay sometimes, y’know.”

“I know,” I agree, “but if you  _ say _ you’re not okay, it makes it more real and thus makes it worse. So if you don’t say it out loud, it doesn’t get worse.”

Gil crooks a critical eyebrow and takes a step towards me. “So you’re not.”

I shrug. “Whether I am or not doesn’t matter. I know it sounds crazy to you, but the voices in my head are criticizing everything I say or think or do, and I can’t escape it. I’m too scared to actually reach out to my own family, partially because most of them actually are in the Italian Mafia, but I can tell other people to reach out to their families which makes me a hypocrite and an asshole. I don’t need voices to tell me that much.”

“Mafia is dangerous turf,” Toni disagrees. “That’s something genuinely scary to avoid—you can’t tell me anyone who knows about the Mafia would call you a coward for not reaching out.”

“Sure,” I dismiss.

Gil grumbles about it, but he recognizes the bypass for what it is. “Whatever.”

Toni breathes and looks uncertainly to his friend. “I don’t like to talk about it because memories. Flashbacks. Whatever you want to call it. I _relive_ _it_ , I don’t just _remember_.”

“Oh,” Gil says blankly.

The silence is broken, to my surprise, by my little brother. Feli rockets across from another part of the park and scoops me up in his arms without asking—which tells me he’s in a very good mood, and totally distracts us from the serious conversation we were having.

“Lovi!” Feli squeals. He kisses my cheek. I pat his back a little, but I’m not in the mood for affection so I don’t hug him back.

Feli pulls back and flashes a smile at me. I strain a quick one back, if only as a plea for him to let go of me.

Feli steps back, squeezes my shoulders, then finally lets go. He doesn’t stop smiling. “Hey, how’ve you been?” he asks excitedly. “You vanished.”

Toni and Gil move a good distance away, out of earshot. I appreciate the silent acceptance that I would rather not speak to my brother about this in front of them.

“I actually had an okay day,” I tell him. “I think I accidentally made a couple friends. I take it you’re having a good time?”

He nods, then he laughs. “How do you accidentally make friends?”

“I found a roller coaster they won’t let you ride alone,” I shrug. “They dumped a random teen on me, and apparently he has Social Anxiety Disorder as well so we get along. His albino friend is pretty okay, too. He punched his blonde friend because he wouldn’t leave me alone.”

“He  _ punched _ somebody?” Feli demands.

“He touched me without asking,” I tell him quietly, “so yes.”

Feli’s eyes widen a little, and his smile fades. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” I assure him. “The other two bought me food and talked to me.”

His smile returns tenfold, and he hugs me again. “I love you!”

“I love you, too, buddy,” I agree with the tiniest of smiles.

Feli runs off. Toni and Gil drift back in. “He’s cute,” Toni says.

“That’s Feli,” I tell him, gesturing after my brother. “He’s my little brother. He’s thirteen.”

“So how old are you?” Gil asks.

“Fifteen.”

Gil laughs. “I’m eighteen.”

“I’m seventeen,” Toni adds.

We move from our little corner now, back towards the people slightly.

Toni still looks kinda spacey, so I nudge him and ask if he’s okay. This time, he doesn’t answer, and his eyes are glazed and far-off. I know from the last time he had a panic attack in front of his albino friend that hugging him works, but my brain and anxiety start to fight for dominance here. Should I touch him or should I not? I’ll cause myself flashbacks if I do, but if I don’t Toni will get lost in his own flashbacks and he doesn’t have the same level of control I do.

After a minute rocking back and forth indecisively on my toes, my brain wins. I breathe, steel myself, and step closer to the frozen Spaniard. He doesn’t react at first as my arms pull him a step forward and grasp a handful of his thin black jacket. After a second or two, he does hug me back, and he buries his face in my shoulder.

Gil looks surprised. “I thought you didn’t—”

I shake my head at him. “I don’t. I have a rule for a reason, and I’m aware of the consequences. This is where anxiety and mind are at odds. I shouldn’t because flashbacks, but if I don’t he’ll get lost in his head. I don’t even hug my brothers half the time. But there are rare exceptions with things like tears and panic attacks and flashbacks where I’ll break my own rule.”

Gil closes his mouth and shrugs it off. “Whatever.”

Toni tightens his grip, and now he’s no longer frozen but he starts to cry instead. I tighten my grip a little on the crumpled teen that stands before me, collapsing from the inside out and slowly losing his mind. I breathe shakily, struggling to keep my breath even and deep enough to prevent slipping into my own flashbacks. If I do, I’m no help to him anyway. I can’t have a panic attack, not now. Count to ten, count the people in the crowd, just keep your head out of the ocean of despair.

After about four minutes, Toni starts to relax. His eyes are no longer far-off, but glazed only with tears and fears. He mutters an apology, and both Gil and I tell him he has nothing to apologize for. He apologizes again, quieter this time, and we assure him it’s okay.

Five minutes pass, and Toni is finally calm. I’m starting to drown. We’ve reversed.

Toni pecks a quick, shy kiss on my cheek and mutters a thank you. He lets go of me. I step back and let my arms fall, and just like that I resurface choking and coughing in my own mind, and I can sort of breathe again. The memories brush at my ankles like fish or seaweed, but they’re not strong enough to hook me and drag me into the depths of the black inky substance I’m treading.

I breathe for a minute and don’t speak. They give me my silent peace, and I’m able to pull myself mostly together and stitch the frays in my life-vest back together. I can float for a little longer.

I shake my head a little and look up. Toni looks unsure of himself, but also sort of happy. It’s sweet that such little gestures mean the world to him. I wish I still had some of that innocence he has, the innocence that was stolen from me years ago.

A smile twitches at Toni’s lips, and he fidgets with the ends of his sleeves. “Thank you.”

I shrug at him, brushing it off as if it didn’t just cause me serious distress to break my silver-lined rule. “It’s okay. What matters is it worked.”

“And in half the time it took before,” Gil points out.

“He’s scared of touch,” Toni points out. “It’s a big deal.”

Gil shrugs. “I’m not complaining, man; I’m just glad you’re okay, or at least mostly so.”

Toni smiles now.  _ Really _ smiles. It even brings the faintest light to those lifeless eyes that almost always scream ‘ _ haunted _ ’ to the world. “I’m okay.”

“Sure?” I ask.

Toni nods meekly. Gil smiles, too. “Good.”

We move back out into the crowd. Toni has a new bounce in his step, and a little confidence. I already know this friendship is going to last.


	3. Gonna Be About A Week

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Toni and Lovi part ways at the end of the day.

**_~Lovi~_ **

“How long are you gonna be around?” Toni asks.

“A week.”

“Me, too,” he smiles. He slides a paper into my hand and runs.

I flip the paper over; it’s a cell phone number, accompanied by a cursive signature I can barely make out to be “ _ Antonio Fernández Carriedo/Toni _ ”. I slide it into my pocket, breathe, and head for the stairs. It’s been a damn long day.


End file.
